Articles

GREAT ADVICE FOR STARTING MUSICIANS (2)

Yesterday part one, today part two!

Never forget the binary code. It’s one or the other. Is your song a ballad, or not a ballad? Is it major key, or minor key? One of the most important things to think about when you’re composing a melody is “am I blues-ing it, or playing static notes, like a keyboard?” Too many people come in on a song and just riff, and it doesn’t become memorable. I always picture it as a keyboard. If I wanted to, which I normally do, can this melody be transcribed in muzak? Can there be a muzak version of it? The best songs in the world are not just riffing. The best ones always think where the notes are going to be in the melody. Give yourself some time when writing a song. Don’t use the first thing that comes to mind. Listen to the chords of A-Ha’s 'Take On Me', or Radiohead’s 'High And Dry'. Then listen to the melody in the chorus.
 


Watch your dynamic. On an acoustic guitar, you have a very set level of dynamics. You can only get as loud as your voice and the guitar will go. That’s your ceiling. It’s all you have, and you have to respect that ceiling. So start out a song really low. Don’t necessarily play it like it’s on the CD, but turn it down. Play an inverse chorus. Go into it small, because you can’t go into it big anymore. If it’s a good chorus, you’ll be fine.
 


A lot of new composers are in trouble. The best composition comes out of necessity. I started playing bass lines simultaneously while playing the guitar because I didn’t have a bass player. But I’m scared now for you guys. You can have a bass player out of Garageband like that. Your ability to publish music really fast is a scary thing, because you don’t need to learn how to play with the right hand. If I had Garageband in ‘99, I could have called a loop up, or a bass line, I wouldn’t have had to dig so deep in composing to get myself out of the corner.
 


There is such a thing as an incubation process for a song. There is also such a thing as an incubation process for an artist. Take your time.

Don’t try and pick your battles. When you do radio shows, the listeners don’t know your influences, or your deepest album cut. When you’re a guest, you already know how to pick your set. I’m going to do 'Daughters', 'Waiting On The World To Change', 'Your Body Is A Wonderland', 'No Such Thing' and 'Why Georgia', and then that’s what’s going to happen. The moment you decide “no, no, no,” you’re done. The moment you decide that you’re going to set the mandate. It’s a very dangerous thing when you become an artist that goes “well, I’m going to change that.” You’re really not. It’s always been that way.

Know what to record. If you only have two cameras to shoot a movie, and you have no special effects budget, what are you going to shoot? Are you going to shoot an action movie? Or are you going to shoot Twelve Angry Men? If you only have three hours in a studio, you can’t make a rock track. You can’t make a shiny spectacle of a hit track. But what you can do is producing smaller versions of your songs. It’s very difficult for a record label executive or A&R person to move a song backwards. When you give someone a track where it’s just you playing guitar, and a little bit of rhythm and a little bit melody, it’s going to be so much clearer to them.
 

Find the theme. Peter Gabriel’s 'Sledgehammer' is a great track, but it starts out with that melody. That’s a theme. The beginning of 'Daughters', that’s a theme. 'No Such Thing', the same. When you produce too large, you lose the theme. The drum starting the same time as the bass starting the same time as a chord means nothing to me. But somebody whistling something over a guitar part, that becomes a theme. That’s why we still listen to 80’s music. So many themes, so many hooks. Just think when you’re making your record “where are the themes?” When you’re at a party and a song starts with just chords, you never recognize it. When it has a theme, albeit whistling or a hook, everyone will go “I know that song!” That will make the song stick. Themes are the things that really make the songs.

I never had a conversation about my image. I do care about fonts and album packaging, but not my image. It’s tricky because I’m a solo artist. I do care about what I put out, but I think it’s strange to have a logo as a solo artist. I have sort of a logo. I’ve given in to it. But I think solo artist have names. In a way, it’s saying “all I’ve got is my music.” Continuum is a very conscientious album cover. It just says “Music by John Mayer. If you like it, you like it, this is what I do.” The name is my record, on a grey background. It has a huge effect. If Norah Jones’ Come Away With Me had a cover with her in the daytime in a poppy field, you have a different album. If it was a painting, it’d be different. The control you have over image is fantastic. You have no control over self-image. But you have control over your product.
 

Great musicians have narrowed what they do to pinheads focus. That’s why Annie Leibovitz is a great photographer. You get there, and the photo shoot is twelve minutes long. Everybody there are doing huge processes, you’re just not seeing it. They’re drawing on years of experience. So their process is internalized. Right now, your process is externalized. You soak everything up. What you hope to do, and what Steve (Jordan) and Pino (Palladino) do is internalize their process, putting it into their own language. Running through crate after crate of things they’ve done. But they’re not discussing it where it doesn’t need to get discussed. And that means that it’s efficient. We’re all really efficient now.


You will have that revolving door. I started a band with friends. I don’t want to talk down about anybody I ever played with – because it’s been a joy to play music with everyone I played music with – but you will go “the drummer’s not right, guitar player’s not right” and that keeps revolving. It’s like a combination lock. I am not a guy who went straight into a great band. I’ve gone through a lot of drummers, a lot of bass players and a lot of guitar players. And it’s not a bad thing. Just move through the revolving door until you find that combination.
 


You don’t have to go to LA to do it. When I went to LA the first time, there were 80 people in the crowd. I didn’t know who they were, so I asked “Why are you here?” And they knew me because they were trading stuff on Napster, et cetera. You can go to India to do it. I don’t think the location matters that much anymore. Ask yourself “where do I want to be?” Go to your hometown. You probably have a friends and family network already there.
 

You can reverse engineer any song you want. You can listen to a song on the radio and go “I want one of those.” Get the sheet music of the song, practice it, steal it and make it your own. And you may think that you’re ripping it off, but you give yourself too much credit, because you didn’t rip it off well enough. So now, you failed at ripping off songs and succeeded at writing your own new song.
 


The number one thing that’ll get you through is Define Your Expectation. Every thing you do you must define. And if you can do that, then you have mapped out something honest and authentic. If you decide that you want to be a pop artist, that you want everyone to hear your songs, you’ve now defined your expectation in a way, that sort of says “if you’ve answered ‘yes’ to this, go to page 6.” And then page 6 says, “OK, listen, you’ve got to compromise now. You are going to be making music for the masses, so you get taxed creatively 20% on everything you write. And if you really want that, then that’s what it’s going to take.” And if you’ve answered ‘no’, and say “I just want to write my music like I want to and I just want to express myself,” then that’s great. But if you’re saying that and you secretly want to be a pop artist, you will fail and be really unhappy. Everybody wants to put a record out that everybody loves. It doesn’t matter who you are.
 


Celebrate. If you put a record out, how many do you want to sell? And if you get those sales, go out and celebrate. Go and eat sushi. If you say “I want to sell 2000 copies” and you do it, celebrate your ass off. For me, I wanted to sell out Eddie’s Attic by Christmas of ‘99. And I did! 180 people. And I celebrated. The idea that you’re going to make it huge and do nothing until then is so against what life is about. Put something up on MySpace and say “I’d like to get to 10.000 hits.” And when you do, appreciate it. If you don’t stop and appreciate these things it is never fun to be a musician. And it’s very fun to be a musician.


That's it! If all of this makes you go “Yeah, I don’t really want unwanted advice”, then I direct you to this. Great song, and lo and behold, it’s about getting unwanted advice!